


The Punchline!

by brevitas



Series: Not the Face! [3]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, Modern AU, superhero au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-28
Updated: 2013-04-28
Packaged: 2017-12-09 20:22:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/777619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brevitas/pseuds/brevitas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire is given an option to stay or go; he stays and meets Ironsmith, a superhero famous for his ability to make whatever he wills from a liquid metal stored within his own body and Animus, a shapeshifter (which is rare enough) who proves to be an empath too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Punchline!

Apollo gestures for Grantaire to follow him to a room he hasn't seen before; it's a bedroom decorated almost all in red, accented with white and black. He can admire that it's done well, and looking around gives the costumed hero a chance to decide what he wants to say.

Apollo, however, apparently doesn't need time, as he cuts straight to the point. "You saw my face," he says bluntly. "With that in mind, we have two options. One; Cerebrum can erase the memory of you meeting me, and the subsequent stay here--"

"Oh fuck no," Grantaire interrupts sharply. "Your resident telepath isn't coming anywhere near me."

Apollo frowns at him, and continues as though Grantaire hadn't said anything. "The risk with this is that our enemies may kidnap and torture you anyway in an attempt to learn where we live, and will probably kill you when you're unable to tell them anything."

He pauses and looks intently at Grantaire now, trying to gauge his reaction at being told he might be murdered. Grantaire looks calm, though one eyebrow twitches. Apollo wonders how many lives he has, or if he is truly immortal like his Greek namesake.

"The second thing is that you could stay here," he says simply. "You would not necessarily need to fight with us if you did not want to, but I'm afraid you'd be under constant surveillance until we could trust you."

This confirms Grantaire's suspicion that Combeferre needs to be in physical contact to do anything past basic communication, which he is grateful for. A limited telepath is a telepath that's much easier to avoid.

"No other options?" Grantaire asks skeptically when Apollo has fallen silent and is watching him. "I've got stay or get killed?"

Apollo offers him a twitch of a smile. "I'm sorry," he says. "Although we're quite friendly here."

Grantaire glances back at the hallway, and wonders if any of his friends are listening in. Somehow he doubts it; this place is like a hippie commune, and they're probably all about trust and peace and shit. He sighs. "What's your name?" He asks, and Apollo quirks an eyebrow. "Tell me your name and I'll stay."

It's clear from Apollo's expression that this isn't a frequently asked question, and one that he's not too keen about answering. He cocks his head but finally says, "It's Enjolras," and offers Grantaire a hand.

"Grantaire," he replies. "It's a pleasure."

When he retracts his hand, his next question is, "What's on your costume?" Enjolras looks down at it and purses his mouth.

"That appears to be brain," he says evenly, and Grantaire grins.

"I didn't peg you guys for the killing type," he admits. "I thought you'd be more like Batman. Tall and dark and regal and shit."

Enjolras snorts and somehow it makes him seem more human; Grantaire's grin broadens. "Sometimes people need to die," Enjolras says, "And we're happy to perform the execution."

There's a knock at the door and whatever more Enjolras might have said on the righteous killing of ignorant villains is cut off. He says, "Come in," and the man from before with the shield (which is now noticeably gone) leans in.

"Hey, Enj," he says, and Grantaire finds it interesting that he'd somehow already known that Enjolras had given Grantaire his true name. "We've got a code red from within the city."

Enjolras' eyebrows tick lower (Grantaire can see them shift under the sheer fabric of his mask), and the hard line of his mouth is obvious. "Who?" He asks sharply.

"Blackbird--she's robbing a bank down on 3rd."

Enjolras glances sidelong at Grantaire, who looks innocent and placates whatever the blonde might say by putting up both hands. "I won't touch anything," he promises.

Enjolras lingers for another moment, and Grantaire can see the energy in every line of his body. It's amazing; he's so mortal, yet ridiculously full of life. Grantaire dubiously thinks that he may have put an excess into the hero--there's no plausible way he can run like this twenty four seven (yet even as he thinks it he somehow believes that Enjolras really does).

"Bahorel will watch you," he says instead, touching the shoulder of the big man in the doorway. When Bahorel looks to argue he says swiftly, "You're hurt anyway," and the boxer's mouth snaps shut into an annoyed frown.

"Combeferre will stay too," Enjolras continues, but it's clear he's no longer talking to Grantaire; he's setting up a contingency plan, and deciding who will come and who will not. "And Courfeyrac. I'll take everyone else."

Grantaire is quick to watch the exchange of names but is unaware of who most of them are. "Bossuet, Joly and Feuilly are still in France," Bahorel reminds him. "Are you sure you're going to be fine with just Marius and Jehan?"

"I can come," Grantaire offers; Enjolras spares him a withering frown.

"I can barely trust you to stay at home," he says truthfully, "Let alone to have my back in a fight. I'll be back soon."

Grantaire wonders if Enjolras is purposefully cruel or if he speaks and gives no thought to who he might hurt. He leaves the room like a departing thunderstorm, and Bahorel studies Grantaire from the door.

"Where did your shield go?" He asks, mainly so Bahorel won't have the opportunity to quiz him about his past. "And all that shit you had on your belt?"

Bahorel grins and says, "I got 'em right here," gesturing to his arm. Grantaire tries to figure out what the fuck that could mean (maybe he makes things smaller, and the little atom-sized weapons are strapped to his forearm) but before he can decide Bahorel smacks his fists together and the shield appears once more.

It takes Grantaire a moment to realize that whatever the shield is made out of, some reflective silver material, poured out of Bahorel's skin, and that when the fighter grins it disappears, the product softening into liquid and disappearing back into his pores.

Grantaire whistles, truly impressed. "What do you go by?"

"Ironsmith," he says with a laugh. "Feuilly named me."

Grantaire tries to gauge whether this so-called Feuilly is his lover or not, as Bahorel pronounces the name with affection and smiles rather fondly. He decides to leave the mystery for later. "So do I get to hang out with you guys in the Batcave?" He asks, and Bahorel smirks.

"Kinda." He straightens and walks back into the hall, gestures for Grantaire to follow. "You get to see Combeferre at his greatest."

They go past that room where Grantaire first saw him, to a door that looks to be equivalent to a bank vault. Bahorel ignores the button on the wall and drags it open himself, and Grantaire watches with a raised eyebrow and adds 'enhanced strength' to Bahorel's list of powers.

Combeferre is seated in the middle of a circle of screens, and seems to be manipulating some of them telekinectically. Grantaire didn't know he could do that either; he's tempted to find a notebook to record what all these kids can do. Usually a human is only gifted with a single power, and most often they're lame--Grantaire considers himself lucky to have flight and immortality, even if he despises the latter.

These boys, however, seem to have a plethora of minor abilities, and one larger one. It's interesting, and Grantaire no longer doubts why the city loves them so; they must be nearly impossible for a standard supervillain to fight, especially when working together.

There's a dark brown tabby cat sitting on the desk playing with Jehan's hedgehog, Hemlock, and Grantaire eyes it but doesn't ask. Bahorel points him to a chair and sits next to him, and from this angle he can see that the monitors have a hundred different things on them, from cameras at street corners to the animated flow of traffic to the local police's private radio.

"Wow," Grantaire says, surprised. "This is kind of awesome."

The cat's eyes flush green, and it says, "It _is_ pretty cool." Grantaire stares at it.

"Okay, guys, superpowers are one thing," he says, "But talking cats are fucking weird."

The cat laughs ( _laughs_ , its whiskers even quiver with the motion) and turns into that curly-haired youth from before, who Grantaire suspects is the aforementioned Courfeyrac. His eyes are the same color the cat's were a moment ago, an unnatural green that contrast with his slender pupils.

"Shapeshifter?" Grantaire asked, absolutely awestruck; shapeshifting is an incredibly rare ability, and when someone does happen to get it, it's almost always limited to one or two animals.

Courfeyrac grins and leans forward, offering his hand. "I'm Courfeyrac, a.k.a. Animus, and yeah, I'm a shapeshifter."

"Animus," Grantaire repeats while he shakes his hand, and grins. "You do know that word doesn't have anything to do with animals, right?"

"Sure," Courfeyrac answers, and his irises turn orange. "But I'm an empath too."

Grantaire blinks and then laughs, shaking his head incredulously (he's never even heard of a shapeshifter with a second ability and yet here's a man with a ridiculously powerful one). "Nice pun, _Animus_."

It's wordplay off of the old Latin for soul, 'animus', which looks surprisingly similar to modern English's 'animal', and thus is a nod to both his powers. Grantaire is rather impressed (and not just because he barely hears Latin anymore).

"Found him," Combeferre says, and a camera changes direction to pivot towards the front of a bank. Grantaire doesn't even question how he managed that; he only leans in, studying the fight.

He picks out Apollo easily, in his brilliantly colored suit, and Jehan is next to him, peeling a glove off his hand. A minion for Blackbird sees him and immediately hurries to get out of his way but Nightshade is fast, and he clamps his hand around the man's forearm. He starts convulsing and his skin turns an ugly black around Jehan's fingers, the discoloration spreading further and quicker. By the time Jehan releases him Grantaire is quite sure the man is comatose, and likely to lose his arm.

There's another superhero they're fighting with that Grantaire takes to be the Marius Enjolras mentioned, and he wears green. Grantaire can't figure out his power, and is distracted by the whirling kick Apollo delivers to a woman dressed all in black before he can find out.

The villain goes flying backwards, one money bag torn from her hand by the throw. But she twists in midair and lands on her feet, and Grantaire watches, impressed, as she sprints down the street. Enjolras does not pursue; he helps Marius and Jehan dispatch the other two robbers, and within a minute all three men are lying unconscious on the sidewalk.

"Damn," Grantaire says aloud. "You guys don't fuck around."

Combeferre looks back at him and grins and Grantaire sees that on screen Enjolras is talking (seemingly to himself, as this video has no audio to check and Marius and Jehan are tying up the criminals rather than listening). "Enjolras says he hopes you've decided to stay," Combeferre says idly, his fingers moving swiftly over a keyboard as he works on a different monitor. "And that he's curious about your healing abilities."

Grantaire snorts. "Tell him to talk to me himself when he gets back," and follows Courfeyrac when he mentions he's going to the kitchen to get a donut.

He's still there when Enjolras comes home, eating a banana and listening to Courfeyrac explain how the colors represent each emotion. When he touches someone he feels what they feel, and while sustaining contact his eyes will reflect their mood. It's actually rather interesting, but Courfeyrac trails off when Enjolras strolls into the room. There's notable blood splatter across his chest, but Grantaire is more distracted by the bruise blooming on his jaw.

"Do you mind, Courfeyrac?" He asks, and Courfeyrac brushes Enjolras' arm when he walks past, turns and winks at Grantaire to makes eye contact. Grantaire wonders what he's trying to say and then realizes his eyes are purple (attraction? Grantaire thinks curiously, but wait, he said the brightness mattered and these are a perfect purpureus and he can't remember what the medium shade means), but Courfeyrac is already gone and closes the door behind him.

"I want to talk about your potential for healing," he says as he sits across from Grantaire, folding his hands on the table.

Distractedly Grantaire says, "Sure, shoot." He tries to decide what purple means, purses his mouth and rolls it around.

Enjolras starts inquiring about how far Grantaire's abilities extend, and whether or not he's able to heal others without dying like he'd done before. Grantaire listens and nods occasionally, and when it finally hits him what it means, he says it out loud.

" _Lust_ ," he says victoriously. "It's lust!"

Enjolras gives him an odd look. "Excuse me?"

"Nothing," Grantaire says, but he nearly gawks at Enjolras when he remembers that Courfeyrac said his eyes showed private feelings when he had physical contact, and he hadn't been touching Grantaire when they turned purple, he'd been touching Apollo.

**Author's Note:**

> requested by austrus and capslock!anon via tumblr.
> 
> sorry it has taken me so long to produce anything, I've been drowning in homework. but here! enjoy (and I really hope you do!)
> 
> btw purpureus is apparently a medium shade of purple and don't feel bad if you had no idea because I didn't either, I was trying to find a different way to say 'medium shade of purple'.
> 
> btw the title is from one of my favorite superhero jokes  
> Q: What is a superhero's favorite part of the joke?  
> A: The "punch" line! 
> 
> tumblr is idfaciendumest, you're welcome to request things there or follow me or just ask me questions or whatever :)


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